All-Inclusive Resort: To Go or Not to Go?

November 29, 20128 comments

You’ve guessed it from the tone of BozAround, I’ve never been one interested in ‘package’ vacation. The term is light years away from the ideas of wanderlust / free-spirit / discovery. But perhaps it’s a bit of a misconceived idea? Yes. We’ve done it. We just went on an ‘all-inclusive’ vacation in Mauritius and I’m not even ashamed to tell you that we liked it! Came home rested (Yes! even with a 2 1/2 months baby). Came home sun tanned (Yes! even with 3 children). And even came home with a smile on our faces after a 12 hours flight!

– It’s buffet-style food, which normally would send me flying back home immediately. But turns out that it works really well when the children are over tired after a day at the beach because it’s fast and there’s always something that they’ll like.

– There are plenty of photo opportunities. The children splashing in the pool. The children finding perfectly shaped shells on the beach (wonder why they’re all in perfect shape?!). The children coming home with a face painting. The children learning tie&dye. The children cooking pancakes. The children going poney riding. The children on a bottom-glass boat. STOP! They never get bored in an all-inclusive resort, and you never have to carry your wallet around because, well, it’s all inclusive.

– Most places usually come with a spa so, as a mom, you’re guaranteed to have a chance to sneak out for an hour or so for a good massage.

– In Mauritius, the service is in general excellent. So you’re pretty much covered that your little tantrums as a sleep-deprived parent will be dealt with efficiently. And that in itself is already vacation.

We stayed at La Residence Mauritius, which is no secret address as it’s on every good travel agent’s website. We booked our vacation with BA travel (first time that we used an airline internal agency and it worked. We got a great discount on the hotel published rates).

La Residence Mauritius: The service was one of the best we’ve seen. The hotel is nice although a tad old-school to our taste. The kids club is not state of the art but the staff (Thank you Antonietta!) is so incredibly kind. The food is a bit repetitive but fresh and tasty. The room is a bit bland but spotless clean and well stocked. So when you’re busy with a family of three to entertain, I now completely understand the rationale behind going all-inclusive. And dare I even say…I could see myself doing it again!

Here’s a photo of Clairette, our wonderful nanny for the vacation. She took care of Lior as if he was her own grand-son and we both shared a tear when we said good-bye. So Sweet.

Do you have any good all-inclusive resorts to recommend in the world?

All-Inclusive Resort: To Go or Not to Go? was last modified: May 11th, 2018 by BozAround

That is the cutest photo! I have many neighbours who have 3, 4 and even 5 kids all under the ages of 10. They have never gone on vacation without an all inclusive and I can certainly understand why. : ) I’m glad to read that mommy & daddy had a restful and good vacation time too!

I can definitely see why people with 2-3 kids would prefer all-inclusive. Heck, I only have one and I can see the appeal. Managing the kids is enough without having to worry about a lot of other details.